There is a quote that says, "You are the same today as you’ll be in five years except for two things: the books you read and the people you meet."

I believe this to be true. People influence, motivate, and challenge. Books help shape thought, introduce new ideas, and educate.

One book that has influenced both Amber and I has been Love Does by Bob Goff. There are so many things I could share about this book. However, there is one in particular that played a huge role in our decision to embark on this adventure to Croatia.

In the twentieth chapter Bob writes about a tradition they have with their children called a "ten-year-old adventure." When the child turns ten Bob would ask them what they would love to do; something that "captured their imagination, sparked their curiosity, or fanned their whimsy." Then they would go do it together. They didn't have all the details planned out or a rigid itinerary, it was an adventure.

He spoke of how God operates in the same way. The following is an excerpt that radically changed my view of what God was calling us to do.

A father's job, when it's done best, is to get down on both knees, lean over his children's lives, and whisper, "Where do you want to go?"

Every day God invites us on the same kind of adventure. It's not a trip where He sends us a rigid itinerary, He simply invites us. God asks what it is He's made us to love, what it is that captures our attention, what feeds that deep indescribable need of our souls to experience the richness of the world He made. And then, leaning over us, He whispers, "Let's go do that together."

It was after reading this that I realized that God had placed a desire and a passion in our hearts for missions. He had given us both a strong sense to go and that He was leaning over us saying "Let's do this Croatia thing together!"